New Hanover board considers pre-K focus to improve education

By 2016, the New Hanover County Board of Commissioners wants to have 80 percent of kindergartners ready for school.

By Ashley WithersAshley.Withers@StarNewsOnline.com

This is a corrected version of an earlier story.

By 2016, the New Hanover County Board of Commissioners wants to have 80 percent of kindergartners ready for school.This lofty goal was adopted by the commissioners in 2011, but so far no steps have been taken to make this dream a reality.At a work session in early February, some members of the new board identified preparing students and improving education in the county as their primary goal, but no consensus was officially reached.During the work session, Beth Schrader, the county strategy and policy manager, presented the commissioners with some options for the best ways to improve education in the area if they were to go that route.“We provide money for education and the school system,” she said. “That school system is responsible for grades kindergarten through 12th, but at the end of the day, the real place where the county has the opportunity to influence education is in the zero to 5-year-old range.”By focusing on the 5-and-younger age group, Schrader said the county will be able to tackle the five specific areas needed to be identified as “ready for kindergarten.”These areas include physical development, social and emotional development, language and pre-literacy skills, cognitive development and being “open to learning.”“Kindergarten eligibility is based on age,” Schrader said. “If a child's birthday falls on a certain date, they enter kindergarten. It has nothing to do with whether or not that child is actually ready for kindergarten.”Currently the only public prekindergarten options are Head Start and a program run by the New Hanover County Schools, both of which are available only to a limited number of families. The rest of the children must go to private pre-K programs or wait until they are old enough for kindergarten.“If we could prepare them for kindergarten, if we could have them walk in the door ready, rather than walk in a year or two behind, it would make it a lot easier for the public school system to take them and bring them further forward,” Schrader said. She said if the commissioners decided to make this a target in the coming year, then they would have to pool the resources of county departments and other entities in the community.“You could use the library for language, parks for physical development. You could see the health department for emotional development and for cognitive, the museum,” Schrader said. “This would be an opportunity for the departments to holistically work together.”County staff also suggested looking into improving higher education. Schrader said the best way for commissioners to make a difference would be to help students finish their college education on time.“We should be trying to encourage folks to complete their coursework on a more timely basis. It not only gets them ready and out into the job market sooner, but it also frees up space for other qualified folks who want to take those classes,” she said. “So instead of spending the six to eight years in college, we want to get them out a little earlier.”The commissioners will be identifying their top priorities for the county in the coming months as they create the 2013-2014 annual budget.The new fiscal year starts July 1.